Resistance During the Holocaust

How could so many peoplesix million Jews and five million others, a number
impossible to imagine from all over Europe be murdered in so short a time? Did anyone
oppose the Nazis? Did anyone come to assist the Jews or other victims of the Nazis? Did the
Jews try to fight back?
Resistance, in many ways, was near impossible for Jews, and it was also extremely
difficult for citizens in the occupied countries. There was little access to weapons, almost no
ability to move about freely, and a majority of the population that for various reasons was
uninterested in resisting the Nazis. Furthermore, open conflict was not a wise alternative, since it
most often resulted in death for oneself and others.
Until it became perfectly clear that the Nazis intended to murder every Jew in Europe,
people hung on to the hope that perhaps their own lives would be spared. Perhaps by being
compliant, doing what the Nazis were ordering them to do, they could survive to the end of the
war. The Nazis encouraged that sense of hope in order to keep the Jews obedient and orderly.
They intentionally deceived the Jews, leading them to believe the relocations and separation of
their families were only temporary, and that they were vital, valued workers for the German war
effort. While the Nazis were masterminding ways to deceptively give Jews hope, they were also
planning and executing their mass murder.
However, it would be a grave mistake to believe that all Jews went to their death like
sheep to slaughter. It would be equally wrong to think that all non-Jews in Europe did nothing.
Despite the odds, many Jews practiced some form of resistance, whether it was cultural and
spiritual, or armed and active. In addition, a small number of non-Jews were involved in

resistance, though they were the exception to the rule. Below describes how Jews and non-Jews
were able to resist during the Holocaust.
Cultural and Spiritual Resistance
The term resistance when related to Jews and the Holocaust takes on a different
meaning than the way most of us understand the term. Jews during the Holocaust were resisting,
among other things, isolation, dehumanization, starvation, illness, and the Final Solution
every single Jew living under Nazi tyranny was sentenced to death. For most Jews, acts of
cultural and spiritual resistance were the only possible means to oppose Nazi tyranny. Such acts
undermined Nazi power and inspired Jewish hope. However, the risks of resisting Nazi policies
were grave; often an act of resistance by one person would mean the death of many others.
Resistance of any kind during the Holocaust required great courage.
Cultural and spiritual resistance took place within the ghettos, but the extent varied from
ghetto to ghetto. Some of the activities were secretive, held at the initiative of underground
organizations; they included literary evenings, gatherings to mark the anniversary of a Jewish
artist, and concerts. Jewish authors, directors, and poets produced works in the ghettos, and there
were secret libraries. Some of the cultural activities were based on works written before the war;
others drew on the situation in the ghetto. Other examples of resistance included creating
schools; printing and distributing underground newspapers; maintaining religious customs;
drawing, painting, or secretly photographing observed events; and keeping records of ghetto life
and hiding them in the hope that they would be discovered after the war. Such cultural activities
helped people temporarily forget the worries of ghetto life and were a source of encouragement.

However, there was also criticism; some people argued that these events were inappropriate in a
place where so many people were dying every day.
In the camps, acts of cultural and spiritual resistance were more difficult but still
occurred. Jews struggled for humanity, for normalcy, and for life by purposefully attempting to
keep themselves clean, not showing emotion to their captures, helping others, organizing
religious worship or by fasting on religious holidays despite the fact that they were starving.
Others worked below their capabilities and sometimes sabotaged goods they were
manufacturing. By making defective products to be used by the Nazis, the workers attained
personal satisfaction through the belief that they were stunting the German war effort.
Though the actual effects of this sabotage on the Nazi war effort cannot be measured, its
effect on the morale of the workers was strong. Through cultural and spiritual resistance, Jews
managed to create a personalalbeit tenuousworld in which small, day-to-day decision-making
mattered, as a way of preserving internal meaning.
Active/Armed Resistance in the Ghettos
In approximately one hundred ghettos, in Poland, Lithuania, Belorussia, and Ukraine,
underground organizations were formed. The purpose of such organizations was to wage armed
struggle, that is, to stage an uprising in the ghetto or to break out of the closed ghetto by the use
of force in order to engage in partisan operations on the outside. In many instances, the two
forms combined, the uprising being followed by an escape from the ghetto. There were also
cases in which the uprising was spontaneous or improvised. In many of the ghettos where
resistance was more organized, Jewish youth movements were deeply involved in the planning

and carrying out of the plans. Active resistance occurred in many forms, from armed struggle
through hiding and escape.
While preparing for armed resistance, secret groups in the ghettos faced extremely
difficult problems, such as smuggling arms into the ghetto, training the fighters under ghetto
conditions, and establishing a method for putting the fighters on battle alert in case of a surprise
action by the Germans. No less difficult was the task of gaining the ghetto residents support for
the fighting underground. It was clear that the insurgents did not have the slightest chance of
forcing the Germans to put a stop to the extermination, and it was equally clear that only a
handful of fighters could actually succeed in breaking out of the ghetto to join partisan units in
order to continue the fight against the Germans. This made the ghetto underground the only
organization of its kind in recorded history to call for an uprising whose primary purpose was to
offer resistance for its own sake.